I upgraded to the new version of Beer Alchemy today (ver. 1.7) and I noticed that all my efficiency numbers have changed... lowered across the board. I'm still looking to see if I notice any other changes, but I'm wondering if this is a new bug, or did it correct a calculation that was wrong all along... Anyone else see similar behavior? Able to shed any light on it?

I sent an e-mail to support and I'll let you know what I hear back...

__________________“Altogether 1420 in the Shire was a marvelous year... The Northfarthing barley was so fine that the beer of 1420 malt was long remembered and became a byword. Indeed a generation later one might hear an old gaffer in an inn, after a good pint of well-earned ale, put down his mug with a sigh: ‘Ah! that was a proper fourteen-twenty, that was!’”

I saw that note, but I'm not sure that it accounts for the changes... I mean it says I'm about 7% less efficient across the board and it's just not making sense...

You might end up being right though, and I'll be sure to report the response I get back...

__________________“Altogether 1420 in the Shire was a marvelous year... The Northfarthing barley was so fine that the beer of 1420 malt was long remembered and became a byword. Indeed a generation later one might hear an old gaffer in an inn, after a good pint of well-earned ale, put down his mug with a sigh: ‘Ah! that was a proper fourteen-twenty, that was!’”

Here's the official reply - I think the second part is what is directly relevant here since it is the actual results that are impacted...

Quote:

In some cases the program was making errors in the predicted OG, color and IBU (losses on transfers were being incorrectly treated). As these errors have been corrected the efficiencies may also have changed. There may still be some changes in the future as in places the program is reporting things as mash efficiencies and they should rightly be called brewhouse efficiencies. These don’t affect the predicted values but the reported efficiencies on actual results. The reasons for this error are long and complicated but basically result from trying to be too user-friendly!

Cheers

Steve Flack
Kent Place Software

__________________“Altogether 1420 in the Shire was a marvelous year... The Northfarthing barley was so fine that the beer of 1420 malt was long remembered and became a byword. Indeed a generation later one might hear an old gaffer in an inn, after a good pint of well-earned ale, put down his mug with a sigh: ‘Ah! that was a proper fourteen-twenty, that was!’”

What was happening in the past was that if the brewer lost some volume between the boil kettle and the FV then the OG, SRM and IBU were reduced by an proportionate amount. Obviously this is wrong as losing a few pints on transfer doesn't in itself change the gravity (don't ask why I did this...I don't know either). If you had the post boil and transferred volumes set to the same amount then you will see no change in the calcs for this new release.

Now, efficiencies...I have not changed how these are calculated in this release. What may have happened however is that the predicted gravities may have changed and that has affected the calculated efficiencies for each batch.

The last comment in my email was relating to another issue which is the program actually reports a brewhouse efficiency as being the mash efficiency. This will change in a forthcoming point release where a mash efficiency will be exactly that....a mash efficiency. All downstream losses will not be taken into account. The reason for this error is that I was trying to take account that some people may not take their pre boil gravity and used the OG / pitching volume instead.

Anyway, I hope this makes things clear. As far as I know, the calculated gravity, color and ibu values are now all correct. The mash efficiency thing will be sorted out shortly.

Version 1.7.1 (released 5th April 2009)
Changed mash efficiency calc for batches so that it is always a mash efficiency not a brewhouse efficiency.

__________________“Altogether 1420 in the Shire was a marvelous year... The Northfarthing barley was so fine that the beer of 1420 malt was long remembered and became a byword. Indeed a generation later one might hear an old gaffer in an inn, after a good pint of well-earned ale, put down his mug with a sigh: ‘Ah! that was a proper fourteen-twenty, that was!’”